Woman police officer pictured hold a gun in her mouth and smoking cannabis in snaps posted by estranged husband

A woman police officer photographed in uniform holding a pistol in her mouth and apparently smoking cannabis in a patrol car is being investigated.

Lisa Latimer's snaps were posted on the social networking site Facebook by the Tampa Bay deputy sheriff's estranged husband.

Todd Latimer has claimed the pressure of having to fit into a male-dominated culture in the police changed his wife and led to their bitter divorce.

Shocking: Lisa Latimer is pictured in her patrol car holding her gun to her mouth

He told Fox TV news: 'Even as a joke, there's things you do and you don't do.

'To do that, to allow yourself to be photographed, I can't even come up with a reason why someone would do that.'

Mr Latimer said male colleagues sent his wife explicit mobile phone images and expected her to become 'one of the guys'.

He added: 'They sent her a lot of sexual harassing phone calls, emails, text messages, things that would be considered inappropriate in anybody's circle.

'She was not the same person that I married at all.

'You have to be one of the guys, and a lot of the girls are able to wave it off as this is just part of the team.

'Unfortunately, some people take it too far.'

Investigation: Mrs Latimer is also seen holding a bottle of beer and smoking what appears to be cannabis

A spokesman for the Tampa Bay sheriff's office said Mrs Latimer was likely to be suspended pending an investigation.

Larry McKinnon said: 'We're certainly not going to tolerate that type of behaviour when it represents the agency like the pictures show.

'Obviously they become very close, they deal with death and violent crime all the time.

'Their sense of humour and their interaction may be somewhat different if we worked at a library.'

Mr Latimer has denied posting the images to get back at his wife during a messy divorce, which features a domestic violence restraining orders and an Internal Affairs investigation over the dicharge of Deputy Latimer's taser.

Lisa Latimer is on holiday, according to the sheriff's office, and was unavailable to comment.